


Desperate Souls

by shalako



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Gen, Horror, but maybe not all the people though, don't count on it, eventual Rumbelle, if it works, people die
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-02-05
Updated: 2017-03-30
Packaged: 2018-03-10 14:30:18
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 9
Words: 15,514
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3293828
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shalako/pseuds/shalako
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A new pawnshop has just arrived in the tiny town of Storybrooke, and soon enough every citizen begins to feel its strange allure. Needful Things AU</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. I've Seen You Before

**Author's Note:**

> Anything you recognize is either from Once Upon a Time or Stephen King's Needful Things and either way, it's not mine.

There was an old abandoned store on Main Street that didn’t have an owner until one day in October, it suddenly did. The men and women of Storybrooke took note of it out of the corners of their eyes, but no one stepped up to the door and knocked. The windows were soaped over; the sign on the door said

MR. GOLD’S PAWNSHOP  
CLOSED

And that was all. Normally, a small and ordinary shop like that would hardly cause a stir; perhaps some people would bring it up in conversation, some might plan a visit, some might make predictions on whether it would thrive or fail. But this pawnshop was different in a very important way, which was this:

Storybrooke was a tiny town, and Mr. Gold was From Away.

Henry Mills heard his mother talking about it in her office, with Sidney Glass. There was no one in town with a last name like Gold -- they had some Goldblooms and some Goldblatzes, but that was beside the point. No one From Away had set up shop in Storybrooke in what seemed like centuries, and it didn’t take long for intrigue to spread.

Henry heard the mild buzz of interest everywhere he went, from the kids at school who weren’t sure what a pawnshop was to his own mother, who showed her interest with a dismissive tone. “Just another store full of moldy rotary phones and overpriced vases, Henry,” she told him. “Don’t step foot in there without me, you understand?”

As if rotary phones were dangerous. Henry rode his bike past the pawnshop every day, on his way to and from school, and he always stopped to try and peer inside. But the windows were opaque from the soap, and there was never any light shining through, never any movement inside, never any delivery men to bring in stock.

Henry’s curiosity was just starting to ebb when October came around and the sign on the front door changed.

GRAND OPENING OCTOBER 7  
YOU WON’T BELIEVE YOUR EYES

Carefully, Henry dismounted his bike and stood it up against the pawnshop’s wall. He huffed warm breath onto his hands, trying to shield them against the autumn chill. You won’t believe your eyes, huh? He felt a shard of his mother’s skepticism wiggling into his heart. What could a stupid old pawnshop have that was so amazing, anyway?

Still, he tried again to see through the soaped-up glass, squinting his eyes until he gave himself a headache. When he hopped back up on his bike and started pedaling home, it was with a new determination. This pawnshop was a mystery, and he’d be darned if he was gonna let it slip by.

Operation Rotary Phone was in effect.

\------------

“Do you really think I care that the pawnshop is opening?” asked Regina into the phone. She was cradling it between her ear and shoulder, hands busy making an apple pie. “Sidney, if you can’t find anything informative to put in the newspaper, I would rather you not write anything at all.”

There was muffled stuttering from Sidney’s end of the line. Henry sat at the kitchen table and watched his mother knead the dough. He tried not to roll his eyes.

“I don’t care if the man’s put out an ad, it’s not relevant,” Regina snapped. “Take it out and replace it with something _classy_ , for God’s sake.”

There was nothing classy about the Daily Mirror. Even Henry knew it, and he was only ten. It was, like many small-town papers, just short of being a gossip rag, and the only actual stories it ever had led to such imaginative headlines as ‘Storybrooke Reaches Record Amount of Snowfall!’ and ‘Have You Seen This Dog?’

He shifted lower in his seat so he could read a comic book under the table without his mother seeing. The local general store seemed stuck in the ‘80s, and Henry was always finding rare and valuable comic books at ridiculously low prices. He had a collection any comics expert would be jealous of; they were hidden under a floorboard in his closet, in case Regina found them and threw them away for rotting his brain.

“That shop won’t come to anything, in the end,” Regina sniffed. “I have a feeling it’s going to fade out of existence soon enough -- give it five months, Sidney, you’ll see.”

She hung up while he was still talking.

\-----------------

It was rare for Henry to walk home from school, and he wasn’t really sure why he did it. It lengthened his route by more than double, but he couldn’t deny it gave him time to think. He was stuck in a marvelous daydream, one where he asked the pretty librarian Miss French out for the Miner’s Day fair. And she said yes.

_“Thank you, Henry,” Miss French says when he asks her, her blue eyes sparkling with tears of gratitude. He loves her eyes; they can be bright like the sky or dark like a storm. “I’ve been … so lonely lately. You see, I -- I lost my one true love.”_

_“I’m here now,” says Henry bravely. “I can help you forget him.”_

_His voice is tough and tender all at once. Miss French smiles at him through her tears._

_“Thank you, Henry,” she says. “And for tonight, since we will be boy and girl instead of student and librarian, maybe you could call me … Belle?”_

_He takes her hands. Looks into her eyes. “I’m not just a kid, Belle,” he says. “I can help you forget him.”_

_She seems mesmerized by this, this unexpected understanding, this unexpected … manliness. Yes, he may be young -- only ten -- but he is already so mature, and more of a man than Garrett could ever be! Her hands squeeze his. Their faces draw closer … closer …_

_“No,” says Belle, pulling away. “It’s not right, Henry, people will talk--”_

_“Baby,” he says, “with you and me, it couldn’t ever be wrong.”_

_He presses his lips to hers. She kisses back and after a few moments she draws away to whisper tenderly --_

“Get the fuck outta the road, kid!”

Henry snapped out of the daydream only to realize he was standing right in front of a parked car. And not just anybody’s car; this junky old Malibu belonged to the very man whose daughter Henry was aiming to steal away. A blush heated up his neck and cheeks instantly as he jumped away, back onto the curb.

“Sorry, Mr. French,” he said. Moe French wasn’t a man to make angry -- he was grumpy enough sober, but drunk? He was a menace. And right now he had an open bottle of beer nestled between his legs, Hank Williams blasting from the radio. Henry tried to make himself very small.

“Just watch where you’re goin’ next time,” Mr. French grumbled, putting his car back into gear. “Next time I ain’t gonna stop.”

He pulled away, leaving Henry to stare at the skid marks on the road. The boy took a deep breath and sighed. He folded his daydream away, wistful at its abrupt and unjust end. Moe had torn it apart just before the zenith: Henry and Miss French dancing in the candlelight at the Miner’s Day festival, kissing beneath the full moon.

Oh well. Miss French was old anyway -- she’d told Thomas Henkel, who was a fifth grader, that she’d turn twenty-six this fall. And besides, she was engaged to stupid Garrett Nell, and why on Earth would Miss French marry a man who’d change her name into a horrible playground rhyme?

Belle Nell, Henry thought to himself, making an face as he shuffled down the sidewalk. Belle Nell. Belle Nell. Belle--

He stopped. He was standing right in front of the new pawnshop, and something had caught his eye. The sign on the door had changed; where it used to say

GRAND OPENING OCTOBER 7  
YOU WON’T BELIEVE YOUR EYES

now it was replaced with a little white sign with red letters, a sign that said,

OPEN

and that was all it said. Henry stood frozen, staring at it, his heart beating fast. He couldn’t tell why he was so excited -- except that it was only October 6th, and the shop was open a day early, and nobody in the world knew about it but him.

Operation Rotary Phone was a success, he realized. He’d be the first person in Storybrooke to know what was inside Mr. Gold’s pawnshop … if he could only convince himself to open the door.

It must be a mistake, Henry rationalized. Somebody put the wrong sign up, and there’s nobody inside, and if I go in I’ll trip some sort of burglar alarm and then I’ll go to jail.

Still, the temptation was huge. It wouldn’t hurt to try the door, he figured. And if it opened and he tripped an alarm, he could always just put on his cutest face and tell Graham it was an accident, that he was tricked by the sign.

He put his hand on the doorknob and hesitated. The windows were still soaped over. What if he went in there and the guy -- this mysterious Mr. Gold, From Away -- was some kind of criminal? A serial killer trying to lure in his prey? He could be just like Norman Bates, dressed up like his mother, ready to threaten any customers with a knife and scary music.

Don’t be stupid, Henry told himself. He screwed up his courage and tried the door.

It opened.


	2. Mr. Gold, From Away

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is technically two put together, since the first was pretty short.

Mr. Gold’s Pawnshop wasn’t very well-lit. The light that streamed in front the windows was dim, and the shop itself seemed to insist on darkness to shroud its products. The thing was, there weren’t a whole lot of products to see. The shop looked deserted, like it was in the middle of packing up and moving away, instead of like it was opening tomorrow.

_Definitely a mistake_ , Henry decided. The shop owner hadn’t even got his stock out yet; there couldn’t be more than a dozen items in all the display cases. The polite thing to do would be to turn around, take the OPEN sign down, and leave.

But no alarms were blaring, and Henry couldn’t force himself to go. He tiptoed over the new wooden flooring, ran his fingers over the glass countertops. They weren’t even a little bit dusty, and that fact disturbed him somehow. He glanced in at the items on display.

Mom was right. This place wouldn’t last a week. At least she was wrong about the vases and telephones; Henry wasn’t sure exactly what he was looking at -- trash, basically -- but he knew it wasn’t _that_.

Henry heaved a deep sigh and retreated back to the doorway. That was where he paused, gazing back into the shop before he left.

“Hello?” he called uncertainly, as if he hadn’t already snooped around. “Is anybody here?”

He was about to turn around and leave when a voice from behind him said, “I’m here.”

There was a sound of movement from the back room. Henry hadn’t noticed it before; a heavy curtain separated it from the main shop, but in the next moment that curtain was being moved aside and a man stood in the doorway, tall and intimidating, his face obscured by a strange glow. Henry’s stomach cramped with a momentary and monstrous fear.

Then the curtain fell back into place, blocking out the glow, and Henry’s fear disappeared. The man before him wasn’t scary, wasn’t even tall. He was small and elfen, dressed in an expensive pinstriped suit, the sort of person Miss French’s boyfriend scoffed at and that Mom called ‘fey.’ But mostly, it was his face that calmed Henry down. The pawnbroker was quite old -- ancient, even -- and he had a kind, grandfatherly slant to his face. He looked at Henry with interest and pleasure.

“Sorry,” Henry said, suddenly feeling ashamed. “I -- your door was unlocked and it said ‘open,’ so I --”

“Of course it’s unlocked,” said the pawnbroker with a smile. “I decided to open it a bit earlier than scheduled. Only for a little while this afternoon, for a bit of a … preview, you understand. You’re my very first customer.” His smile widened, his voice becoming a shade more theatrical. “Enter freely, my friend, and leave some of the happiness you bring!”

He stuck his hand out for a shake and Henry didn’t hesitate to take it. He regretted it instantly; for a moment that was brief but overwhelming, the pawnbroker’s hand felt unearthly and strange. Henry could’ve sworn he felt scales, and the feeling nearly made him sick.

Then it was gone, and the proprietor of the shop was smiling an infectious smile. Henry liked him instantly. He felt stupid for being scared; this man had eyes the exact shade of blue as Miss French’s, warm and inviting. They could have been father and daughter -- or soulmates. He’d read an old fairy tale once about soulmates sharing the same color of eyes.

For some reason, Henry didn’t even feel jealous.

“I’m pleased to meet you,” he said, a phrase he’d learned from rote memorization at Regina’s knee. The pawnbroker’s dark-blue eyes fastened on him like the hooded railroad lamps that lit the train tracks, hypnotizing and familiar.

“And I’m equally pleased to make your acquaintance, young sir,” he said, and that was how Henry Mills came to meet the owner of Mr. Gold’s Pawnshop before anyone else in Storybrooke.

* * *

“I’m Mr. Gold,” the small man said, “and you are --?”

“Henry. Henry Mills.”

“Very good, Henry. And since you’re my first customer, I think you’ve earned a discount. Let me know if anything catches your eye.”

Henry nodded dutifully, but he knew he wouldn’t be buying anything today. Mr. Gold’s shop may be full of trash, but Henry knew how pawnshops worked, and there was nothing he could buy here for the ninety-one cents he had in his pocket.

“Thanks,” he said, “but I don’t get my allowance ‘till Friday -- and, uh, it doesn’t really look like you have your stock in yet, so …”

Mr. Gold smiled. His bottom row of teeth were crooked, and they looked a little discolored in the dim light, but Henry found the effect to be startlingly charming, not off-putting at all.

“No,” Mr. Gold said, “no, I don’t. The majority of my -- stock, as you put it -- won’t arrive until later this evening, alas. However, I think you’ll find I’ve still got quite a few interesting items. Take a look around, Henry, you might surprise yourself. And I’d love to have your opinion, if nothing else.”

Henry grinned at that, cast a cursory gaze around the shop. When his stare bounced back to Mr. Gold, the man was looking at him with one eyebrow raised, a look that reminded Henry of the old black-and-white comedies that Dr. Hopper loved to watch, and he had to bite back a wave of good-natured laughter.

“I hope I’m right in presuming you have a mother,” said Mr. Gold smoothly. Henry nodded. “I thought so. I know orphan boys when I see them, and you’re far too healthy and clean.”

“I’m adopted,” Henry said, feeling awkward and embarrassed at correcting an adult.

“I know,” said Mr. Gold. “The fact remains, you’re not an orphan.”

Hesitantly, Henry nodded once more.

“This couldn’t have worked out better,” said Mr. Gold. He made a grand hand gesture, and for a moment Henry could have sworn the pawnbroker’s nails were long and sharp, blackened with dirt. Then he blinked and realized the opposite was true; he was pretty sure Mr. Gold’s nails were manicured. “You will tell your mother about my shop, perhaps even show her what you bought, if you happen to buy something--”

Henry thought once more of the ninety-one cents in his pocket but didn’t say anything.

“--and she will tell her friends, should she have any, and they will tell their friends …. You see, Henry? You’re the best advertisement system a man could ask for! Couldn’t have done better if I sent you out there to dance around in a sandwich board.”

Henry wasn’t sure what a sandwich board was, but he couldn’t help smiling anyway. Mr. Gold was lively and expressive and elegant in a way no one else he’d ever met was. It was like talking to an actor.

“Take a look around,” said Mr. Gold, and Henry obeyed. He walked slowly over to the case nearest the door then glanced over his shoulder, certain Mr. Gold would be following him. But Mr. Gold was still standing behind the counter, his eyes not on Henry but focused instead on a ledger. For a moment, Henry was shocked. Store owners always followed him around, certain he would either break or steal something. Mr. Clark from the general store always made a point that his store was full of video cameras, and even Ruby never let Henry around the dessert displays on his own.

Feeling pleased and grown-up, Henry put his full attention on the items for sale.

“Take your time,” said Mr. Gold, still looking at his ledger. He made a note in it and then glanced up to flash Henry a smile. “Shopping is an unparalleled joy when one goes about it patiently, Henry, and an awful pain in the arse when one doesn’t.”

Henry nodded, and a question bubbled out of him before he could stop it. “Mr. Gold, are you from overseas someplace?” he asked. The man’s accent reminded him of Graham’s, soft and hypnotizing.

“You could say that,” said Mr. Gold agreeably.

“England?” Henry guessed. “Or Ireland?”

“Let’s call it Scotland,” said Mr. Gold, wrinkling his nose. “I always thought I’d look dashing in a kilt.”

That struck Henry as funny, like the one-liners in sitcoms that he giggled about whenever Mom was out of the house and he could watch them on TV. He burst into laughter before he could stop himself, feeling like he’d wandered into a quirky TV show, mysterious but benign. He had a moment to wonder if he was being rude -- Regina always accused him of rudeness -- before he heard Mr. Gold chuckle and knew he was OK.

“Go on, keep looking,” said Mr. Gold with a wave of the hand. “I’ll tell you all about my history some other time.”

So Henry looked. There were only five items in the big glass case. One of them was a pair of ugly puppets, the kind of thing that would have given him nightmares if he was just a few years younger. They looked like people with dried and shrunken skin and he didn’t like to look at them for very long. The second item was a little wooden donkey, the kind of figurine that would fetch a dollar or two at a flea market, but nothing more. The third item was a plastic sailboat, the kind of item you got at souvenir shops down by the beach. The fourth was a rock full of tiny little crystals. They caught the light and reflected it straight into Henry’s eyes, dazzling him. The fifth item was nothing but a shard of glass.

He pointed to the crystal. “That’s a geode, isn’t it?”

“You’re a well-educated young man, Henry,” said Mr. Gold from behind his counter. “That’s exactly what it is. I have a little plaque explaining where it’s from, but I’m afraid it’s still unpacked. Like most of my stock. I’ll have to work like the very devil to get everything ready for tomorrow.” But he didn’t sound worried, and he seemed perfectly content to stay where he was.

“What’s this?” asked Henry, pointing to the shard of glass. His doubts about the pawnshop’s future were renewed. He liked Mr. Gold, and he seemed like a smart man, but there was no way a store like this could do well in Storybrooke. It’d be gone by Christmas.

“Oh now, _that_ really is a gem,” said Mr. Gold. He stepped out from behind the counter, and Henry realized with a jolt why Mr. Gold hadn’t been following him around -- the man walked with a cane. “Let me show it to you, Henry.”

He walked around the display case, leaned his cane against it, produced a fat ring of keys from his pocket and selected one with hardly a glance. He unlocked the case and plucked the shard of glass out without care.

“Hold out your hand, Henry,” he said. Henry stared at the shard doubtfully.

“I better not,” he said. “I’m pretty clumsy.”

His head was filled with visions of seaside souvenir shops, where little plaques on the wall declared the customer’s responsibility for any items broken. He could almost see the shard of glass falling from his hand, shattering on the floor, could hear Mr. Gold’s voice turning cold and explaining that that shard of glass was worth five hundred dollars, and Henry better have it by the end of the day.

“Nonsense,” said Mr. Gold. “I know clumsy boys when I see them. You’re the epitome of grace.”

He dropped the shard into Henry’s palm. Henry stared at it with some surprise; he hadn’t even realize his palm was out until he saw the shard there. There was an odd feel to it; it was heavy and light at the same time, and Henry felt like he was touching every part of it, not just the outside but all the particles that knit together on the inside of it, as well.

“It’s weird,” Henry said, but his voice was full of awe. “It doesn’t really feel like glass, it feels like --”

“Sand,” he and Mr. Gold said simultaneously. Henry startled, almost dropping the shard, and he stared at Mr. Gold in horror, certain he would find the other man wearing a disapproving glare. But Mr. Gold didn’t seem to have noticed.

“It is sand, in a way,” said Mr. Gold. “Do you know how glass is made, Henry?”

Struck mute, Henry shook his head.

“It’s made by melting a selection of minerals together,” said Mr. Gold. “Silica is the most central ingredient -- sand, that is -- but you can’t have glass without soda ash and limestone. Put them in a furnace and wait a while, and …”

He trailed off. Henry stared down at the shard of glass.

“Wow,” he said.

“Most glass is formed by glassmakers,” Gold said. “But this shard you’re holding was formed naturally. It’s over two thousand years old.”

Shakily and with great care, Henry deposited the shard back on the display case. Without blinking, Mr. Gold picked it up and put it back in his hand.

“You won’t break it, Henry,” he said. “Have you ever heard of Fingal’s Cave?”

“No,” Henry whispered. He couldn’t take his eyes off the piece of glass.

“Don’t worry, most people haven’t. It was called _An Uaimh Bhinn_ , when I was young.”

Henry nodded, not really sure why he should care about a cave.

“This shard of glass was found there,” said Mr. Gold, “in 1756. At that time, it was part of a larger structure, a crude coffin with human remains inside -- oh, don’t worry, it’s been sterilized.”

Henry breathed a sigh of relief.

“Experts say the coffin was formed somewhere else,” Mr. Gold said, “and then transported to this cave. Whoever was in it was very important, Henry, very loved.”

Henry closed his fingers carefully around the glass, and instantly a feeling of nausea and distortion overtook him. He felt … well, dizzy wasn’t the perfect word for it, but it was the best word he knew. And the feeling wasn’t fading. He looked up at Mr. Gold, who suddenly seemed stranger, his eyes bigger and off-color, his skin a shade of greenish-gold.

“Close your eyes, Henry,” Mr. Gold invited. “And tell me what you feel.”

Henry obeyed, and the pawnshop floor swayed beneath his feet. He didn’t see Mr. Gold’s lips twitch, a sinister look that was half-smile and half-sneer, and he didn’t see the pawnbroker’s eyes turn cold and calculating. Henry was lost in the sensations bombarding him, a feeling of disconnect that made him feel like he was flying, plummeting into a different world.

He had a vague sensation of movement, of something cold against his feet, and he recognized that feeling and recognized the rustling noise that whistled through the air.

“I’m in a forest!” he cried, and almost opened his eyes before he remembered and squeezed them shut again. “I feel like I’m in a forest!”

“Do you, indeed,” said Mr. Gold, and to Henry’s ears he sounded impossibly distant.

The sensations intensified. He could feel grass sticking to his feet, cold and wet from the morning rain, and his feet were bare now, no sneakers here. Far above him, birds were chattering and somewhere nearby a deer could be heard picking its way over twigs and fallen leaves. And most intriguing of all was an entirely human sound, a sound that came from seven separate voices and which Henry would know anywhere -- crying.

Beneath his hands, he felt something larger than him, a semi-smooth surface made of glass that hadn’t quite melted together right, glass that still felt a little bit like sand, and he knew in an instant that this was the coffin his shard of glass had once been part of.

He felt an emotion rising in him, an emotion that wasn’t his own, and then a foreign word was on his lips, a word he somehow knew without translation -- _Snow_ \-- and then everything was dwindling, every feeling was fading back to black.

He opened his eyes.

“Welcome back,” said Mr. Gold wryly.

“ _Whoa_ ,” Henry said.

 


	3. Spiderman

“Cool, isn’t it?” Mr. Gold said cheerily. He plucked the shard out of Henry’s hands and placed it back into the display case, locking it once more. Henry’s heart was beating fast, his chest was heaving, but he could feel himself slowly coming back down to Earth.

“Cool,” he agreed. His breath escaped him in a long sigh and he bent to stare down at the shard. His fingers were tingling, but not bleeding, from where he’d clenched them around the sharp glass, and he could still call up the sensations that it gave him -- the smell of the forest, the wind against his face -- with ease, but he had an awful, sorrowful feeling that these sensations, like dreams, would pass.

“It’s a bit outside your price range,” said Mr. Gold. Henry knew that, intellectually, but the words still came like a blow to the gut. “Some mythologists like to believe the coffin held the spirit of a god, carried down to Earth to rest. Of course, anything two thousand years old will attract a bit of mysticism to it.”

“Two thousand years old,” Henry breathed, the number shocking him anew. The image of the forest had seemed so clear, so present. “Are you sure?”

“I am indeed,” said Mr. Gold. “I have a certificate from MIT, where it was carbon-dated. That goes with the item, of course. But you know, I really believe it might have come from the gods. Or at the very least, the spirits.”

He stared speculatively at the shard, then raised his dazzling blue eyes to meet Henry’s.

“It may be an ordinary substance, in the end,” he said, “but I dare say it produces an … extraordinary sensation when it’s held, don’t you think?”

“I _guess_!” Henry said. He was only now being struck by how much he wanted that shard. He’d never felt anything like that before -- like magic was real, like it was available. Like he could fly. He felt winded and awestruck, and all he’d done was stand there and hold a piece of glass. It reminded him of when Regina took him to the beach, when he was five, and he’d found a conch shell and held it to his ear to hear the ocean. He’d held that conch shell to his ear all the way home, and loved it better than all his toys until he broke it a year later. The shard of glass was like that conch, but in 3D and Surround Sound.

“How much … how much would you sell something like that for?” Henry asked tentatively, pointing a shaking finger at the display. Mr. Gold contemplated the ceiling, chewing the inside of his cheek.

“Oh now,” he said, “that would depend entirely on the buyer, I think. What about you, Henry? How much would you be willing to pay … for _something like that?_ ”

His eyes were focused on Henry, staring right into his head. Henry gulped.

“I don’t know,” he said, thinking of the ninety-one cents in his pocket with regret. “A lot!”

Mr. Gold laughed at that, but he moved away from the case, and Henry knew without asking that his chance at owning the shard was lost. As Mr. Gold passed under the light from one of his lamps, Henry noticed that he’d made a big mistake regarding Mr. Gold’s appearance -- he’d thought the other man was ancient and grey-haired, but now he saw that there was just a little silver at the temples, and Mr. Gold was hardly old enough to be anybody’s grandpa.

“Well, this has been terribly interesting, Henry,” said Mr. Gold. “But I’m afraid I have a lot of work to do before tomorrow--”

“That’s OK,” said Henry quickly. “I gotta go anyway, Mom wants me home before four--”

“Oh, no, no, no!” said Mr. Gold just as quickly as Henry had. “You misunderstand me. There’s no sense in you looking at the few things I have out here, is all. There’s nothing here to catch a young boy’s interest. I only meant that -- well, I do have quite a few items in the back, and I know my stock very well. If you tell me what you’re interested in seeing, I’m sure I can find it. What would you fancy, Henry?”

“Jeez,” Henry said, his mind whirring. There were a thousand things he’d like to see, but how was he supposed to answer a question so poorly asked as that? There was no way he could think of just one thing, especially with that shard of glass still heavy on his mind.

“It’s best not to think too deeply on these things,” said Mr. Gold. His voice was idle but his eyes were sharp. “I’ll ask you again. Just tell me the first thing that comes to mind.”

Henry nodded. He squeezed his eyes shut, tried to clear his mind.

“Henry,” said Mr. Gold, “when I say ‘Henry Mills, what do you want most of all in the world,’ what is your answer?”

“Spiderman,” Henry said. He didn’t even have to think, but his face heated up as soon as the word was out of his mouth, certain Mr. Gold was going to laugh at him.

“Spiderman,” said Mr. Gold thoughtfully.

“Well, not Spiderman himself, obviously,” said Henry, blushing. “I mean the comic book.”

“I suppose you’ll be wanting The Amazing Spiderman, Number One,” said Mr. Gold regretfully. “A bit high-class for my little shop, alas.”

Henry was so dumbfounded that Mr. Gold knew about comic books as well as geodes and shards of glass that for a moment he couldn’t speak.

“No,” he managed finally. “Not the first one. Mr. Clark, the guy who owns the general store, he sells a bunch of comic from the ‘80s. I don’t think he knows how much they’re worth.”

“Ah, the Copper Age,” said Mr. Gold, eyes turned up to the ceiling in thought.

“He never has the issue I need, though,” Henry said. “I want The Amazing Spiderman, issue two-ninety-nine. It’s the first appearance of Venom. I got a lot of issues off the Internet for my collection, but that issue’s super-expensive, and they only ever sell mint-condition ones I can’t afford.”

“I imagine so,” said Mr. Gold. He smiled. “I believe I have something that will make you very happy, Henry. Wait here.”

He vanished back through the curtained doorway, leaving Henry to stand there alone and excited. He jumped from foot to foot, tried to stem his anticipation. It wasn’t smart to get himself worked up; Mr. Gold knew enough about comic books to make conversation, but he was still pretty old. He probably had a bunch of Spiderman comics from last year, was all. Nothing to get excited about.

From behind the curtain, Henry could hear the sound of boxes sliding across the floor, mild thuds as items fell to the ground.

“Just a moment, Henry,” Mr. Gold called. “I thought I had a shoebox around here somewhere …”

“You don’t have to go to any trouble, Mr. Gold!” Henry called back, another phrase he had memorized from Regina. He hoped Mr. Gold would go to all the trouble necessary.

“I was sure it was here,” he heard Mr. Gold say in a mutter. “Maybe that box is in one of the shipments still en route.”

Henry’s heart sank. Then:

“But I was sure … wait. Ah-ha!”

The curtain was pushed back and Mr. Gold limped up to the counter with an old milk crate in hand. It was filled with comic books, each secured in its own plastic sleeve.

“Here they are,” he said with a smile. Henry thought he caught a glimpse of a gold tooth, but he was too thrilled to be sure. Mr. Gold’s hair was in disarray, and there was a bit of dust on the lapel of his pinstriped suit. “I was hoping there might be an inventory sheet here, but … ah, well. As I said, I have a pretty good idea of what I have in stock. And I’m quite sure I saw….”

Here he trailed off, and Henry watched as Mr. Gold flipped rapidly through the comics, his fingers moving too fast for him to possibly see the titles.

“Wait, was that the first issue of Action Comics?” asked Henry, rising up on tiptoes. The images were going by too fast for him to tell. “That’s gotta be the most expensive comic book in the world!”

“Yes, yes,” said Mr. Gold absently. “A little of everything, Henry, that’s the key to a successful business. Diversity, pleasure, amazement, fulfillment. It’s what a successful life is all about, for that matter. I don’t give advice, but if I did, you could do worse than to remember that … now, let’s see, I know it’s in here somewhere … somewhere …. Ah!”

He pulled a comic book from the middle of the box like a magician doing a magic trick, and Henry froze in anticipation. Slowly, Mr. Gold turned the comic around so he could see.

It was The Amazing Spiderman, issue 299. It was the original, from 1988. And it was _signed_ , signed by the artist who’d done the cover.

“To my good friend Henry, with best wishes, Angus Koufax,” Henry read in a hoarse whisper.

And then he couldn’t think of anything to say at all.

 

 


	4. Mr. Koufax

He looked up at Mr. Gold, his mouth working. Mr. Gold smiled.

“A nice sort of coincidence, isn’t it?” he asked. “Though I admit, it is a bit bizarre.”

Henry couldn’t talk yet, so he settled for a solemn nod of the head. Mr. Gold handed the comic over to him gently, and the weight of it, the feeling of the plastic in his hand, nearly overwhelmed him.

“Take it out,” Mr. Gold invited. Holding his breath, Henry shook his head.

“I can’t.”

“Well, I can,” said Mr. Gold firmly, and he reached into the plastic slip and caught the comic book between two slender fingers, placed it like he’d placed the plastic into Henry’s hands.

Henry stared down at it in awe. There were dents on the cover of the comic book, left by Angus Koufax’s pen as he signed his name --  _ their _ names. The artist had held this comic book in his hand and left his mark on it, and once upon a time a boy with Henry’s name had waited in line at a convention, maybe for hours, maybe for just a few minutes, to get his brand-new comic book signed.

Suddenly it came again, the feeling from when he’d held the shard, but this time it was much, much stronger.

_ The smell of grass and pencil shavings. _

_ The roar of the school bus driving away.  _

_ The weight of a backpack pulling on his shoulders. _

_ “Mr. Koufax, could you sign your book for me?” _

_ His name is Henry Yates, and he’s been screwing up his courage for ages, just to ask his neighbor for a signature. He shouldn’t be so scared; Mr. Koufax has been his neighbor for years. He even shoveled their driveway two winters ago, when it snowed really bad. But Mr. Koufax wasn’t a famous comic book artist then. _

_ Dark eyes. A narrow face. He was mowing the lawn when Henry stopped him, and now he wipes sweat off his forehead and says, “Sure, Henry. You got a pen?” _

_ He does. Mr. Koufax signs the cover for him and hands it back. _

_ “You wanna be an artist when you grow up, Henry?” he asks. _

_ “Yeah,” Henry lies. He really just wants the signature. _

_ “Practice makes perfect,” says Mr. Koufax, and he goes back to mowing his lawn. Henry turns away, starts walking back up to his house. He can smell the pot roast Mama’s making for dinner and it makes his mouth water, so he quickens his step and -- _

“Henry? Henry?”

Long fingers were snapping under his nose. Henry blinked in surprise and looked up at Mr. Gold’s amused face.

“Are you there, Henry?”

“Sorry,” Henry said, blushing.

“Not to worry.” Mr. Gold didn’t ask for the book back; he leaned forward on his forearms, let his gaze flicker to the ceiling. “Let us say, Henry, that  _ you _ are the buyer of this comic book. Let us say that. How much would you pay for it?”

Henry’s heart sank. He knew exactly how much this comic book is worth; he’d seen it on the Internet.

“All I’ve got is --”

Mr. Gold’s left hand flew up. “Shh!” he said. “Not another word! The buyer must never tell the seller how much he has. Might as well hand me your wallet. If you can’t tell a lie, then bite your tongue, my boy. That’s the first rule of business.”

His eyes were so wide and dark Henry felt like he was swimming in them.

“There are two prices to this comic book,” said Mr. Gold. “Half of that price is money. The other half is a deed. Do you understand?”

“Yes,” Henry said. He felt far again -- not just far, but Far Away. Far from Storybrooke, far from the pawnshop, even far away from himself. The only thing that seemed close to him was Mr. Gold’s wide, dark eyes.

“The cash price for a 1988 signed issue of The Amazing Spiderman, number 299,” said Mr. Gold, “is eighty-five cents. Does that sound fair to you, Henry?”

“ _ Yes _ ,” Henry said. Nothing had ever seemed more just. He felt himself dwindling, dwindling away … and reaching the point where any clear memory would simply cease to be.

“Good,” said Mr. Gold’s soft voice. “As for the deed … do you know a woman named Mary Margaret Blanchard?”

“Miss Blanchard, sure,” said Henry out of his growing darkness. “She’s my teacher.”

“Yes, I believe she is,” Mr. Gold agreed. “So listen, Henry. Listen carefully.”

And he must have gone on, but Henry couldn’t remember anything after that.


	5. Closed

“Go on now,” Mr. Gold said, shooing Henry out the shop. “Have a nice day, Henry. Don’t forget to tell your mother and her friends what a good deal you got, OK?”

“OK,” Henry said. He felt bewildered, but it wasn’t exactly a bad feeling. It was like he’d just woken up from a wonderful dream -- a long and restful nap.

“And come again,” Mr. Gold called, just before he shut the door. Henry stood there, the comic book in one hand and six shiny copper pennies left in his pocket. Some sort of deal had been made, and he couldn’t remember what it was, but he knew he had no regrets.

It felt like he’d spent hours in the tiny pawnshop, but the clock across the street read ten past four -- it’d been less than twenty minutes. A sense of wonder crept up on Henry, tinged so slightly with unease that he didn’t even register its existence. He turned back to the shop.

The sign on the door said

CLOSED


	6. Belle French, Scouting

There was an unspoken rule in Storybrooke when a new business came to town: one cannot be the first person to enter, and one cannot be the last person to leave. The first week was a trial, and everyone knew it except business owners From Away. The men and women who visited their store during the first seven days weren’t customers at all, but scouts. They were there to interrogate the proprietor, to evaluate the quality of his goods, to determine within one week whether Storybrooke would make this business a success or if they would leave it out to dry.

Everybody knew these rules. And everybody followed them, except for two women: Belle French and Emma Swan. Emma disobeyed through disinterest; she couldn’t care less about a new shop, couldn’t care less about businessmen From Away, and the women of the town were quick to whisper that this was because Emma Swan simply wasn’t one of them.

She was strange, in that she was both a local and From Away herself. She’d been shuttled into Storybrooke’s foster system when she was maybe fourteen, and she’d shuttled herself out again four years later, pregnant with Neal Cassady’s child, and when she’d come back the child was nowhere to be seen. Had it died? Had she given it up for adoption? No one knew, and Emma wouldn’t tell, and the people of Storybrooke were eager to pretend she didn’t exist.

Belle was different. Belle didn’t disobey out of disinterest; she disobeyed out of kindness.

She disobeyed with a cake.

\----------

It was thirty minutes to eight on October the seventh, and Mr. Gold’s Pawnshop was open for business. The display window had been washed clean of soap, and several items had been artfully arranged there, for passersby to see. A mobile made of crystal unicorns, a wooden windmill that looked just tacky enough to adorn a Storybrooke lawn.

Belle stood there for a moment, her eyes jumping from item to item, and then she opened the door and walked in. A bell jingled overhead; it hadn’t been installed the night before when Henry Mills came to visit, but Miss French had no way of knowing that. She shifted the Tupperware container in her arms and breathed in the smell of a new, uninhabited space, and as she did a thought came to her, sudden and clear:  _ This place is a success. It may not have customers today, but it will, and it will never go away. _

Belle didn’t normally have thoughts like that. She had great instincts, but that was a goddamn  _ vision _ . Mr. Gold’s Pawnshop would go through the same trial period as everyone else’s stores, and she would do well to keep her hasty judgments to herself.

A man was writing in a ledger behind the counter, and he looked up to smile at Miss French when the bell jingled. “Hello,” he said. 

Belle was an intelligent woman who knew her own mind very well and generally liked what she found there, so the moment of confusion that struck her when she met this stranger’s eyes was confusing in and of itself.

_ I know him _ , was the first clear thought to come through that unexpected cloud.  _ I’ve met him before. But where? _

She hadn’t though. That surety came to her a moment later. What she felt was nothing but deja vu, a sense of false recollection. It was a disorienting feeling, at once dreamy and prosaic, and she couldn’t help but think it fitting. It matched the shop.

She managed a lame smile in return and adjusted her grip on the Tupperware. Her hands were aching; underneath her trim blue gloves, they were covered in a storm-cloud of bruises, and she wasn’t sure of the cause. There was a little child inside Belle’s brain -- a younger version of herself, too bright to have a lot of friends, unattractively obsessed with horror stories -- who whispered that the bruises came from a ghost’s hands, trying to pull her out of bed while she slept. But that was ridiculous, and she clamped down on the pain before the pawnbroker could notice.

His eyes narrowed at her like he had. He had intelligent brown eyes that made it seem like he would notice anything.

“Hello,” Belle said. “I’m Belle French. I’m the librarian, from across the street. I figured since we’re neighbors, I should drop by and welcome you to Storybrooke before the rush.”

He smiled, and his entire face lit up. Belle felt an answering smile lift her lips, even though her left hand was still smarting like a bastard. If she weren’t already engaged to Garrett, she had a feeling she’d fall in love with this stranger in a heartbeat. ‘Show me the bedroom, Master, I will go quietly.’ She wondered with wry amusement how many ladies would stop by today only to go home with a newfound crush. He had an accent and he wasn’t wearing a wedding band: more fuel for the fire.

“I’m delighted to meet you, Miss French,” he said, stepping out from behind the counter. “I’m Mr. Gold.” He switched his cane to his left hand and held out his right to her, then frowned in confusion when Belle stepped away.

“I’m sorry,” she said, “I don’t shake hands. I know that must seem awfully impolite--” She set the Tupperware container down on the countertop, tried to think of a good excuse for why it hurt to touch. “I, uh, I’m always dropping books on my hands. Clumsy, I guess.”

She watched him, looking for the traces of embarrassment or discomposure that people usually registered when she refused to shake hands with them. Mr. Gold’s amicable mask hadn’t changed a bit. Instead, he grasped her forearm with both his hands and gave that a quick, firm shake before letting go. It should have struck Belle as inappropriately intimate, but it didn’t. It was a friendly gesture, brief and rather amusing.

All the same, she was glad it was quick. For a moment, his hands had felt almost … scaly. 

“I’m delighted you came over, Miss French,” he told her. He had an infectious smile, one that reminded her of the mischievous little boys who wreaked havoc in her library. “I must confess, I’ve got an awful case of stage fright.”

“Really? Why?” 

Mr. Gold raised his eyebrows, seeming surprised that she asked for a reason. But his answer came out fast and honest. “I keep wondering what I’ll do if no one comes in,” he said. “No one at all, all day long.”

Belle could feel her heart softening. “They’ll come,” she assured him. “They might not be very warm and friendly, but they’ll come by the dozen. They’ll want a look at your stock, and more importantly, they’ll want a look at you. Storybrooke doesn’t get a lot of visitors, you know.”

“I know,” he murmured, staring at the floor. Belle couldn’t seem to stop herself from comforting him.

“It’s just the way it is here, but you’ll do fine,” she said. “They wouldn’t even be so cold, normally, it’s just -- well, in a town like this --”

“No one wants to seem too eager,” Mr. Gold finished for her. “Yes. I’ve had experience of little towns. My rational mind knows exactly what’s going on, and you’re telling the absolute truth, but there’s another voice that just goes on saying, ‘They won’t come, Gold, ohhhh no, they’ll stay away in  _ droves _ , just you wait and see.’” 

She laughed. She couldn’t help it -- this was exactly the fear she’d had when she opened the library for the first time. It had been closed for years, and the mayor had been loath to open it again. Belle remembered being so sure it would be a success -- up until the very first day of business, and then she’d been so sure of the opposite that she’d nearly thrown up.

“But what’s this?” said Mr. Gold, touching the Tupperware container carefully, like it might bite him. Belle took a moment to admire his long and narrow fingers, forcing back the thought that there was something strange about his nails.

“It’s a cake,” she said. “You’ll get more like it in a few weeks, I suppose, once the town figures out that they like you.”

He looked absolutely delighted. “Why, thank you! Thank you very much, Miss French -- I’m touched.”

“It’s nothing,” Belle said, and then, a little more timidly than she would ever admit, “Please, call me Belle.”

“Of course,” he said graciously. “And you can call me Mr. Gold.”

He didn’t give a reason why.


	7. Devil's Food Cake

It was devil’s food cake -- Mr. Gold ascertained that much as soon as he lifted the lid and the scent of fresh-made pastry filled the air. He asked her to stay and have a slice with him. Belle demurred. Gold insisted.

“Nobody goes to the library this early anyway,” he said, wrinkling his nose. “And no one will set foot in here for at least two hours, because they can’t be seen coming in too early. And I have a thousand questions about the town.”

So she agreed. He disappeared through the heavy curtain into the back room, and Belle could hear the clunk of his cane on the stairs. The upstairs area must be his living quarters, she supposed, until he could find a decent house in Storybrooke. She could hear him in the rooms above her, gathering plates and silverware for the both of them, and she took the moment of privacy to look around.

A sign on the wall said the shop would be open Mondays, Wednesdays, Fridays and Saturdays from eight in the morning to five in the afternoon. It would be closed Tuesdays and Thursdays until the early spring. Belle supposed that must be when Mr. Gold planned to hire an assistant or two, if business went well.

She turned her gaze to the items on display. The things Henry had seen the night before -- the geode, the puppets, the shard of glass -- were still there, but they’d been joined by hundreds of other things, and all of them were accompanied by little silver plaques.

It was truly a hodgepodge assortment of goods. Belle’s eye was untrained, but she could still spot the disparity in quality from item to item. A Turkish rug hanging on the wall looked like it could fetch hundreds of dollars easily, but the set of lead soldiers on the shelf beside it could have been cast in Hong Kong just last week.

This wild variety was present in the display cases as well. There was a cheap plastic sailboat that you could get at any souvenir shop for $4.99, and right next to it was a set of antique French dolls, their porcelain faces handpainted, their eyes hypnotizing. A chipped and charmless teacup was flanked by a pair of gorgeous hand-carved bookends, and a well-used oil lamp sat beside a glasswork jewelry box with a Tiffany seal and words stamped into it that read:  _ Holland, 1879 _ . There was an ancient-looking catalogue placed beside it -- a Blue Book from the same company and same era. The items sold as a set.

Belle’s eyes kept dragging back to the bookends. It took her several minutes to realize it wasn’t the bookends she was really fascinated by -- it was the teacup wedged between them. She forced her gaze away and took a moment to read the plaques. Each item had one.  TRI-CRYSTAL GEODE, ARIZONA , read one.  CUSTOM SOCKET-WRENCH KIT , read another. The one in front of Henry’s glass shard read  NATURAL-FORM GLASS, FROM ECHO CAVE. And the plaque beside the trading cards and comic books announced that  OTHERS ARE AVAILABLE UPON REQUEST .

All the items, whether trash or treasure, had one other thing in common, Belle noticed. Not a single one of them came with a price tag.

* * *

 

Gold arrived back downstairs with two small plates, a cake-knife, and a couple of forks. “It’s an awful mess up there,” he confided in her, removing the top of the Tupperware container. He set it down upside-down, so it wouldn’t leave a ring of frosting on the counter. “I’ll be looking for a house as soon as I get settled. As things stand, I’m living over the store, but I think I’ll have to surrender it to all the cardboard cartons. They’re like invaders -- God, I hate cardboard cartons. Who would you say --”

“Not  _ that _ big,” Belle protested, her eyes wide at the slice Gold was cutting for her. “For heaven’s sake --”

“Sorry,” said Mr. Gold cheerfully, sliding the thick slice off the cake-knife and onto one of the plates. “That’ll be mine, then. Like this for you?”

“Even thinner,” Belle said. She watched Gold try to stifle a smile.

“I can’t cut it any thinner than this.” He carefully extracted a narrow slice of cake and secured it on a plate that he slid across the counter to Belle. “This smells heavenly, Belle. Thank you again.”

“You’re more than welcome.”

It did smell good, and she wasn’t on a diet, but there was still a reason Belle asked for a thin slice. Hell, there was a reason she’d refused in the first place. While Mr. Gold wasn’t looking, she flexed her fingers and tried not to hiss at the pain. When she regained her composure, she noticed he wasn’t eating, apparently waiting for her to start, and so Belle would just have to get over her embarrassment ( _ potential _ embarrassment, that is) and get to work.

She peeled her blue gloves off and set them down gently on the counter. The bruises seemed even more ghastly in this shop’s dim light than they had when she discovered them this morning. Belle grasped the fork carefully, trying not to bend her fingers too far, and when she finally lifted a bite of cake to her mouth, Mr. Gold joined her. He was right, it was heavenly -- not as heavenly as eating cake  _ should _ be, considering, but good enough.

Belle grimaced in pain as she went for another bite, her fingers twingeing, and she caught Mr. Gold looking at her sympathetically.

_ Now he’ll commiserate _ , she thought with a feeling of dread and boredom in her stomach,  _ and tell me how bad his grandfather’s arthritis was, or how his war buddy could never eat without pain after the grenade took his pinky finger _ . _Or something._

But Mr. Gold didn’t commiserate. He took another bite of cake and rolled his eyes to the heavens, a look that was just over-dramatic enough to make Belle choke back a laugh.

“Nevermind the library,” Gold said, “you should have opened up a kitchen.”

“Oh, I didn’t make it,” Belle said, startled. She’d meant to tell him that, but must have got distracted from it somehow. “But, uh, I’ll make sure to pass your compliments on to Ruby Lucas. She and her grandmother do all the cooking at the diner down the street.”

“Ruby Lucas,” said Mr. Gold thoughtfully, cutting another bite from his slice.

“Yeah -- do you know her?”

“Oh, I doubt it,” he said. He glanced up at her, looking like he’d suddenly remembered where he was. “I don’t know  _ anyone _ in Storybrooke, come to think of it. You said she waitresses the diner?”

“Yes,” said Belle, though she wasn’t entirely sure she  _ had _ . Something to that effect, though.

“I’ll have to visit sometime,” said Mr. Gold. “God knows I can’t cook for myself.”

Belle nodded -- she doubted very much that Mr. Gold couldn’t at least whip up some instant noodles, though his tastes probably ran in a more expensive range -- and in the comfortable silence that settled in, her head was filled with thousands upon thousands of different questions for him. Where was he from? Why had he come to Storybrooke? Would he stay long? Did he have family? But like he sensed her thoughts, Mr. Gold interrupted the silence with his own questions, and beat her to the punch.

His questions were unobtrusive and impersonal, not about Belle but about the town. It took her a few moments to realize that, and when she did she felt almost like Gold was leading by example, telling her silently what she could and couldn’t ask.

He wanted to know about the politics in town, and what traffic was like on Main Street in the evening, and how the weather was in winter, which was fast approaching. He asked her if she knew of any real estate agents who weren’t utter thieves or where he could get a little Jøtul stove. He asked about insurance rates and which supermarket was the best and a hundred other things. Every answer Belle gave was jotted down in a little leather book he’d pulled from behind the counter. Upside-down, his script looked fancy but unreadable.

Belle looked down at her plate and saw that she’d finished her slice. Her hands still hurt, but less than before, and she knew it was impossible but it seemed as though the bruises were already fading. They’d never healed that fast before.

She recalled that she’d almost not come today, when she saw those bruises. She’d told herself it wasn’t worth it, but then she’d remembered the cake Ruby made for her and decided that she had to at least pop in for a few minutes and say hi. Now she was glad she did.

“I have to go,” she said regretfully, checking her watch. “If I don’t open the library soon, people’ll think I’ve died.”

Mr. Gold gathered their plates and stacked them, placing the forks on top. He put the lid back on the Tupperware container. “I’ll return this as soon as the cake is gone,” he said. “Is that alright?”

“Of course!”

His face broke into same mischievous grin from earlier. “You’ll probably have it by tonight, then,” he said.

“Well, you don’t have to be  _ that _ prompt,” Belle said as Gold walked her to the door. “It’s been very nice to meet you.”

“Thank you for stopping by.” For a moment she thought he was going to touch her arm again, and felt a bizarre mix of dismay and excitement -- both silly, of course -- at the thought. He didn’t though; both hands remained on the handle of his cane. “You made what I thought would be a scary day into something of a pleasure," Gold said.

“You’ll do fine,” Belle told him. She turned to open the door, but hesitated. She’d asked him nothing about himself, respected his unspoken request for privacy, but there was one thing she was curious about, too curious to leave without asking. “You’ve got all sorts of interesting things, Mr. Gold --”

“Thank you.”

“--but none of them seem to have any price tags. Why is that?”

He smiled at her. “That’s a little eccentricity of mine. I’ve always believed that any sale worth making is a sale worth dickering over. I think I must have been a dealmaker of some sort in a previous incarnation.”

“Bargaining for first-borns, most likely,” Belle said.

“Not so loudly, dearie,” said Mr. Gold with his eyebrows raised. “The town might hear.”

He said it seriously, and again Belle was struck by how deeply brown his eyes were -- how oddly beautiful.

“Don’t worry about customers, Mr. Gold,” she found herself saying. “Trust me, come Friday, this place will be so thick with people you’ll have to sweep them out with a broom.”

“You think so? That would be lovely.”

Belle smiled, her hand on the doorknob. “Goodbye, Mr. Gold.”

“Goodbye, dear.”

She exited onto the street, pulling her blue gloves back on, and Mr. Gold watched her from inside his shop. His lips curled up, a cold facsimile of smile.

“You’ll do,” he said softly in the empty shop. “You’ll do just fine.”


	8. Sidney Glass

Belle’s predictions proved true -- by ten o’clock, the store was filled with window-shoppers. Old women cooed over antiques that they remembered from childhood, and two teenagers from the high school one town over stood in solemn, quiet conversation near the baseball cards. They were staring, nearly salivating, at a collection of knives that had been locked away, and occasionally one or both of them would shoot a questioning glance Mr. Gold’s way. They were pondering the price.

Mr. Gold didn’t move from his spot behind the counter. Sometimes he would look up, smile as he answered a question, but unless someone wanted an item from the display cases, he stayed put.

But when Sidney Glass entered the shop, Mr. Gold didn’t just stay put. He froze. His eyes shuttered, any warmth lost in an instant.

Sidney strolled forward with his hand outstretched. “Mr. Gold!” he said, his voice booming. “My name is Sidney Glass, I’m a reporter for the local paper.”

Mr. Gold offered him a thin smile but didn’t shake his hand. Sidney seemed to shrug this slight off with ease. He hefted his camera.

“If you don’t mind, I’d  _ love _ to take some pictures.”

He said it with a large, expectant smile, and at this point everyone in the shop had turned to watch. Mr. Gold’s answering grin was visibly forced; he looked more like an animal baring its teeth than anything.

“I’m afraid I’m a little too camera-shy for that,” he said in a voice that was little more than a tense whisper. Sidney was taken aback, but he recovered quickly.

“Well, how about some quick snaps of the shop, then? If that’s OK?”

“Be my guest,” said Mr. Gold, and he gripped his cane tightly and retreated to the room behind the curtain. The patrons who remained behind looked at each other uneasily, and then at Sidney, who seemed too baffled to complete the task he’d come for.

Finally, he raised his camera to his eyes and let the flash blind everyone in sight -- once, twice, a dozen times. When he was done, he hemmed and hawed, and stepped up to the counter.

“Mr. Gold?” he called. There was no answer. “I, uh, I’m just gonna leave my card here on the table for you.” He fumbled in his jacket pocket for a pen, and nearly dropped it on the ground when he got it out. Something about the shopkeeper -- about the shop in general -- had unsettled him. Quickly, he scribbled down the sentence Regina had drilled into his head, word-for-word, the way she wanted it. ‘Mr. Gold, we’d love to do a piece on you for the Community page.’ Nothing special, but Regina never trusted Sidney’s wording on things like this, always insisted that he use her exact wording. She said his grammar might offend.

He left his personal number beneath the sentence, capped his pen, and got away.


	9. Felix

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the hiatus. Here's a long chapter. This part is kind of loosely based on the part of Needful Things where the guy buys a fox tail but instead I used Felix and Devin from the Neverland arc and also there is no fox tail

It didn’t take long for violence to visit Mr. Gold’s pawnshop -- it came just as he was flipping the  OPEN sign to  CLOSED . He could see his last customers of the day loitering outside, but their backs were turned to him, so they couldn’t see him watching, and the autumn breeze was whipping their windbreakers so loudly that he could have shouted and they wouldn’t have heard. They were the boys from earlier today, the boys who (he could only assume) had skipped a class or two just to go antiquing.

It was sad, the things kids played hooky for these days. They’d been too shy to ask him about prices during their first visit; he’d smiled and nodded at them as they skulked away, adolescent anger brimming under their brows. But Mr. Gold knew all too well the allure of his little shop, and the boys had been back before the day was out -- fifteen years old and jobless -- with thirty dollars that they’d managed to scrounge up between the two of them.

They solemnly informed Mr. Gold that he was in possession of a bounty: the elegant, straight sword that was locked up by the door. One of the boys -- the elder, Mr. Gold guessed, by two months and thirteen days -- placed his cash on the counter and tried to look hard. Mr. Gold glanced down at the pile of crumpled dollar bills and carefully stacked quarters, then dragged his gaze back up.

“No one’s ever taught you how to bargain,” he said. His voice was too toneless to make the words form either a statement or a question, and for a long moment the teenager’s posturing faltered and he looked younger than he would’ve liked to know.

“I taught myself,” he said. Mr. Gold hummed.

“What’s your name, lad?”

The boy’s chest puffed out. “Felix,” he said. 

“Felix,” Mr. Gold repeated. “And you?”

“Devin,” said the other boy. Mr. Gold nodded once, slowly.

“Why don’t you two show me this dagger you’ve found?”

The boys swaggered to the shop’s entrance and came to a stop at the farthest display case, unconsciously assuming the most intimidating positions they could think of -- Felix leaning backward on the glass surface with his ankles crossed, the other boy folding his arms, feet planted firmly on the ground. They didn’t seem to notice they were blocking any view of the dagger. Mr. Gold only looked at them for a moment, then used his cane to gently nudge them out of the way, and at once their confident poses dissolved into slouches.

“Which one?” Mr. Gold asked, though he knew exactly which one they were after. This case was full of rusty pocket-knives and old collector’s items which had failed to accrue value of any kind. He’d placed the singular exception square in the middle on a little platform, slightly elevated, so it stood out from the rest, so the ceiling lamps would catch its blade (and hopefully, somebody’s eye).

But the boys were eager to show off their knowledge, so Mr. Gold kept all his thoughts inside.

“That one, right there,” said Devin. He pointed, the tip of his finger leaving a grease mark on the glass. Mr. Gold didn’t have time for a response. “I recognized it from my dad’s collection, cuz it was always my favorite. Except his was fake. Mom took it to the Antiques Roadshow and they said it wasn’t worth five bucks at a county fair. But this one’s  _ real _ .”

“See that stuff on the hilt?” Felix interjected. Gold tracked it with dutiful eyes. “That’s ray skin.  _ Real _ ray skin -- rays like what live in the sea. So what you’ve got is a Type 94 officer’s sword. You know where they made them?”

The plaque in front of this particular weapon read  _ Japan, 1945 _ . 

“Why don’t you tell me,” Mr. Gold said.

“ _ Japan _ ,” Felix said, eyes sparkling with a predatory gleam. “They made ‘em in  _ Japan _ , during World War Two. Well, the Type 94’s they made in the thirties, but they were  _ used _ in World War Two. Officers carried them. They’re worth a  _ lot _ of money.”

Behind them, thirty dollars in pocket change lay forgotten on the counter.

“Yes, I’d say so,” Mr. Gold agreed without any proper excitement. “Thanks for telling me, boys, I’d been wondering where that old thing came from.”

He took up his cane and returned to the front counter. Disappointment flashed in the boys’ eyes for a moment -- and just a dash of anger was there, as well. They were at an age where the only thing worse than being uninteresting was being thought childish, and here was Mr. Gold, studying his ledger with their pile of cash lying no further away than the width of a spider’s leg from his arm. And he was ignoring it. He was acting like it wasn’t even there.

Felix caught Devin’s eye. Devin flexed his fingers, nerves bubbling up inside him, and clenched his hands into fists.

“Would you like to see it?” asked Mr. Gold politely. His pen kept scratching at the paper, his eyes remained fixed on his notes, but the boys were frozen in place. The seconds ticked by without an answer until finally, eyebrows raised, Mr. Gold glanced up.

“Yes,” said Felix, but his voice was little more than a hoarse croak. He cleared his throat and tried again. “Yes, please.”

“Of course.”

He produced a ring of keys from his pocket, and for the moment, the boys’ anger subsided. Gold unlocked the case, paused dramatically, and finally held the sword balanced in his palms, shining in the dim light from overhead. Felix’s eyes narrowed, and Devin’s pupils became two spaces so small and dark that they could only hold one emotion at a time, and at present their sin of choice was greed.

“What do you think?” asked Mr. Gold. The boys didn’t appear to hear him. “Neat, isn’t it? Not often that you find a historic relic lying about.”

He reached into the display case and plucked out the sword’s scabbard. Felix and Devin both jumped, holding their breath like he might break it. But Mr. Gold’s touch was light, and the items seemed to dance over his fingertips like feathers on the wind.

“I’m afraid the law of this good state prohibits me from selling weapons to minors,” he said, his voice sounding far away. His eyes were wide and dark, and he winked at them conspiratorially. “But I think for the right price, we can overlook that.” He ran the pad of his finger along the edge of the blade, examined the bloodless slit it left in his skin. “Well, I’ll give it points for style, but I think in a  _ fight _ …” He slid his grip down to the narrow guard and wrinkled his nose. “...I’d much prefer a bowie knife. Wouldn’t you?”

The boys didn’t answer. Their mouths were too dry and something about Mr. Gold’s soft voice and his eyes as stark and grim as outer space had slowed their brains down almost to a halt. 

Outside, at a time which Miss Belle French assured him was Storybrooke’s biggest rush hour, there was no one to be seen -- not a single solitary car. Unusual, the townsfolk would agree, if any of them noticed it. Mr. Gold’s lips curled into a smile.

“Let’s make a deal,” he said.

* * *

 

They left, and Felix was clutching the grip, and Devin’s hands were wrapped around the now-covered blade. They looked dazed, awestruck at how easily Mr. Gold had been persuaded. 

“I can’t believe we got him to sell it,” said Felix. His breath formed a cloud in the cold air around him. Devin nodded, though he wasn’t sure he remembered convincing Mr. Gold of anything. Still though, it was easier to play along than to ever argue with Felix.

“My mom’s gonna  _ freak _ ,” he said, and tugged on the blade. The scabbard slipped up, but the sword itself stayed put. Felix was still holding onto the grip.

“What’re you doing?” he asked steadily, face blank. In a brief moment of hesitation, Devin’s fingers loosened. He quickly clenched them again, tamped down the feeling of unease that had jumped into his throat.

“I’m taking it home,” he said, trying a smile. Felix didn’t respond in kind.

“No, you’re not,” he said. Devin blinked rapidly.

“Yes, I am,” he protested. His voice went embarrassingly high, cracking like a little kid’s. “Felix, like half of that money was  _ mine _ , you said I could take it home!”

“No, I  _ didn’t _ ,” Felix snarled. He yanked on the sword, but Devin didn’t let go and the two of them stumbled to the left. Inside the pawnshop, Mr. Gold leaned against a display case and picked up a tarnished teapot, examining it under the poor lighting. It was almost closing time -- nobody from Storybrooke would be shopping after five -- but he could spend the twenty minutes he had left doing something useful, and polishing old silver was as useful as anything else, so he procured an old rag and set to work, blind and deaf to any squabble that took place outside the pawnshop doors.

“It’s  _ mine _ !” Devin said, his voice rising loud enough that it should have drawn attention, but the streets of Storybrooke were strangely dark and sleepy today, and no one was running to tell them to shut up. “It’s  _ my _ fucking knife collection, Felix, you wouldn’t even  _ want _ it if it wasn’t for me!”

He dug his feet into the pavement and threw his strength into a mighty pull, and if Devin’s brain hadn’t been so foggy at that moment, he might have heard the sharp  _ crack! _ of the scabbard, realized the damage he was doing, and stopped. But all he could register was the baring of Felix’s teeth, the wild look in the other boy’s eyes, and when Devin threw the crumbling scabbard to the ground, both boys renewed their grip not on the handle, but on the sword’s blade.

“You’re too stupid to even know a real sword when you see one,” Felix growled. Blood from his fingers seemed to melt into the blade, mingling with Devin’s, turning the dull gleam of metal to a fresh, wet red. Inside the pawnshop, Mr. Gold’s eyes flickered to the window and then straight back to his silver. “If I wasn’t here, you wouldn’t have even  _ seen _ this thing, you woulda walked outta there with a  _ pocketknife _ or some stupid old  _ stuffed toy _ \--”

He pulled hard, viciously, and Devin stepped forward instead of backward in a desperate attempt to catch Felix off-guard. He could feel the point of the sword, hard and sharp against his belly, and then both boys lost their footing and fell in a pile to the ground.

Devin’s head hit the concrete and blackness exploded before his eyes. For a moment, he was floating -- then he was back to Earth, lying on the sidewalk, and he’d let go of the sword in the fall. He caught a glimpse of Felix’s even, fresh-out-of-braces teeth, smeared with blood from where he’d bit his own tongue. And he caught a glimpse of an animal spark, almost golden, in his best friend’s eyes.

It was amazing how much you could ‘catch a glimpse of,’ so to speak, in the space of a single second. Devin saw those little details, and Felix, from his slightly-better vantage point, had time to see the growing ring of purple around Devin’s eye, had time to wonder when he’d managed to throw a punch.

As for Mr. Gold, in that split second, he only caught the blur of a slashing blade out of the corner of his eye.

* * *

 

The hospital lights were flickering just enough to drive Emma Swan up the wall. She had a notebook full of questions and answers -- from Devin, from Devin’s parents (who seemed loath to be near each other, even in the wake of their son’s stabbing), and from Felix’s mother, her blonde hair wild and matted like she hadn’t left bed in weeks. But Felix himself was sleeping deeply, unconscious despite a lack of any visible injury to his body.

Emma frowned, tapped her pen against the paper and skimmed through her notes again. There hadn’t been any weapon found at the scene, and Devin claimed not to know how he’d been wounded. They were all shallow cuts at least -- a gash across his cheek, a light puncture wound on his belly.

“Tell me what happened,” Emma had said in a voice she could only hope sounded inviting, warm. She didn’t think she’d ever master the kind of charm that Graham exuded, but she could try. And honestly, when it came to dealing with fifteen-year-old boys, Emma had the advantage over Graham any day. Even now, with a black eye and two stab wounds and his parents in the room, Devin was eyeing her boobs. 

“I don’t really remember anything,” he said. Emma tried and failed to catch his gaze.

“Well, tell me whatever you  _ do  _ remember, then,” she said. Devin looked at his parents for help, and when they didn’t return his glance he started scratching at his bandages instead, bringing spots of red out to mar the wide expanse of white. His pupils were blown, but he didn’t act high at all; to Emma, he seemed like all her childhood fights reincarnated into human form: a little scared, a lot jumpy, and mulishly, stubbornly pissed.

“I don’t remember  _ anything _ ,” Devin said. “I swear to God. It’s like I got hit by a truck.”

“You were in the street?” asked Emma, pen poised, deliberately playing dumb. Devin seemed personally offended by her misinterpretation.

“No, I was on the sidewalk,” he said.

“So you were on the sidewalk, just outside the library --”

“Outside the pawnshop,” Devin corrected. Emma raised her eyebrows at him.

“You sure you don’t remember any of this?”

A dull flush crept up Devin’s neck, into his cheeks. He skipped the beseeching look to his parents this time and went straight to glaring at the wall.

“I don’t get why you’re interrogating  _ me _ about this,” he said with a sort of sullen aggression. “I’m the victim here.  _ I _ got stabbed.”

“Mm-hmm,” Emma said. “You said this took place outside the pawnshop?”

Devin plucked at the thin hospital pajamas that a nurse had forced him into. “Yeah,” he said.

“I didn’t know there were any pawnshops in Storybrooke.”

“The  _ new _ one,” Devin said slowly, like he was talking to a small child. “It just opened up. Do you even pay  _ attention _ to this town?”

“Devin,” his mother said softly. It was the first word she’d spoken in hours, since her own brief interview was over. Devin didn’t seem to hear her.

“So, a new pawnshop,” Emma said, scribbling that down. “What’s it called?”

Devin didn’t answer her. Emma stared at him from over the top of her notebook, waiting, but the boy was content to act as though he’d gone deaf and blind. Eventually, Emma turned her gaze onto the parents, and Devin’s father shifted his weight for a moment before saying, “Mr. Gold’s. It’s called Mr. Gold’s. It’s on Main Street.”

Emma nodded her thanks and jotted that down as well. When the ‘interrogation,’ as Devin put it, dwindled to a slow and painful death, she retreated back into the hallway and tried to figure out a battle-plan. It was nearly ten at night and the shop would certainly be closed -- and Graham would probably want her to stay, wait for Felix to wake up -- but she was sure it couldn’t hurt to take a look at the crime scene. She might find a weapon, something the paramedics missed: signs of a struggle, indicators of a mugging. Devin was missing fifteen dollars that he’d had in his pocket, but he said he couldn’t remember where it went.

Her mind was made up in an instant. Emma stuffed her notebook into the pocket of her leather jacket, zipped it up against the cold night wind, and stepped outside.

* * *

It was too cold for any sort of investigation, Emma realized as soon as she got out of her yellow Bug, but she was already here and there was no way she was leaving without some sort of clue. She clenched her teeth to keep them from chattering and fumbled for an embarrassing amount of time, trying to turn on the flashlight. Her thumbnail scraped against the switch uselessly, sending a gruesome clicking noise down the street in echoes. Emma felt the frustrations of the day surging up to her face in the form of a frown; finally, the flashlight surged to life.

Storybrooke was dead this time of night; nothing but the sound of wind and week-old rain-water in the gutters. With the arrival of October, all the trees in Storybrooke turned shades of red and gold, and right now Emma couldn’t tell if she was listening to the skittering of dead leaves across the sidewalk or the quiet shuffle of rats.

She cast her light around the concrete and caught the splatter of dried blood, the crumbled, scaly-looking case of … well, something. She couldn’t be sure what. 

With a sigh, Emma glanced up and froze. The sign on Mr. Gold’s door read

OPEN

She narrowed her eyes and pulled her wrist up close to her face, trying to make out the numbers on her watch. 10:03 -- what the hell was a pawnshop doing open at 10:03? It must be a mistake. She stepped forward carefully, avoiding the ruined scabbard and drops of blood, and squinted through the darkened windows to try and find a light. She wasn’t sure, but it looked like somebody might be in the back, behind the curtain.

Emma pulled away, calculating her choices. If the shop was open now, it had likely been open when the boys got into their fight, and with nothing but large windows covering the storefront, it was almost certain that Mr. Gold had seen something, maybe even knew who their mysterious stabber was.

She tried the door and it swung open at her touch like a well-rehearsed magician’s rabbit. The pawnshop sprawled before her, a dim grotto stuffed with shadows, and Emma was reminded vividly of Aladdin’s Cave of Wonders. Henry loved that movie; he could tell the story word-for-word -- from the Disney movie, if he was with her, or from the ancient translated text if he was with Regina. Even as she stepped over the threshold, Emma could hear Henry’s voice in her ear, chanting the lyrics to  _ Friend Like Me _ so fast she could barely understand them.

This daydream overtook her dangerously fast -- thinking about Henry always did that to her -- and in her distracted state, it seemed to Emma like one moment she was in the shop alone, and the next … she wasn’t. A small man who could only be Mr. Gold stood before her with a polite (or predatory) smile. He had the body language of a snake, something that normally brought Emma’s guard up like a giant, protective glass dome. But after a momentary tension, Emma relaxed. This man was harmless -- he was small, smaller than her, even, and all she needed was a single glance at his pinstriped suit and manicured hands to know he’d never done a day’s hard work in his life. 

And besides, he had the most hypnotic grey-blue eyes. When she turned her head a little, looked at them from a different angle, they seemed almost hazel, and when she moved to the side, the lamplight from the street shone in and changed that hazel (ever so briefly) to green.

“You forgot to turn your sign over,” Emma heard herself say.

“No,” said Mr. Gold politely. “I don’t sleep very well, I’m afraid, and sometimes I get inspired to open late. One never knows when some midnight shopper might come wandering in. Please, feel free to look around.”

His words were light and friendly, but his eyes never left Emma’s, and they reminded her of a hawk’s.

“I’m not here to shop,” she said. She stepped forward, pulled the little notepad out of her jacket pocket. “My name is Emma Swan, I’m the sheriff’s deputy. I’m here to ask you about the fight that happened earlier tonight, outside on the sidewalk.”

She gestured over her shoulder. Mr. Gold’s gaze didn’t so much as flicker away.

“I must confess myself surprised,” he said, doing a passable imitation of shock. “Any rough-housing in or near my place of business is, of course, highly discouraged. And rather distressing to hear about, I might add.”

“Mm-hmm,” said Emma flatly. Her fascination with Gold’s eyes was fading quickly -- it helped that they’d ceased their quick shuffling between colors and settled on the original, bland blue-grey. “Maybe you can tell me something about the scuffle -- it happened around five p.m.”

Mr. Gold tapped a long, slender finger against his chin in thought. “Five o’clock,” he mused. “That’s just around closing time for me.”

“And yet you’re still open,” Emma pointed out. Gold nodded graciously.

“Indeed, I am. Not my usual habit, I can assure you. Still, I don’t believe I was in the main shop at five. I was taking a call.”

“A call,” Emma repeated. Her eyes flickered over to the heavy curtain behind Gold. “In the back?”

“Yes,” he said. 

“Can I see your phone?” Emma asked. If he’d really been talking to someone, there would be a record of it in his cell. Assuming, that is, that his phone was more modern than 1986 … and looking at the man himself, that seemed unlikely.

“Do you have a warrant?” Gold asked, eyebrows raised. Emma couldn’t force herself to answer. “I thought not. I like to consider myself an accommodating man, Miss Swan. I don’t do things for free, but I understand the … potential  _ urgency _ of your request. Perhaps we could work out a deal?”

“Or  _ perhaps _ I could make one quick phone call and just get that fucking warrant,” Emma said. A slow smile spread over Gold’s face, and Emma was perturbed to see that  _ this _ smile -- unlike all the other ones -- actually reached his eyes.

“I suppose you could do that, too,” Gold said. He had the same look on his face that Henry got when he was trying to con her into feeding him ice cream for lunch, and for a horrible moment, Emma felt herself smiling back at him. “But I think it’ll be faster if you simply humor me,” Gold said. “I’ll be frank with you -- my phone records aren’t going to aid your investigation one bit, so it wouldn’t be fair of me to request something large. Why don’t you just take a look around the shop, see if there’s something you like? And in return, I’ll fetch my phone for you.”

He flashed his teeth at her in a grin, but Emma only frowned. “I think I’ll go get the phone myself, actually,” she said. He wrinkled his nose, curled his lip like a viper preparing to bite.

“That’s not the deal, dearie.” 

She cocked her head and sized him up, trying to determine whether it was worth it to argue. Gold stared back at her calmly and nearly without expression; if she had to pin an emotion to him, Emma’s only choice would have been ‘amused.’ 

“Fine,” Emma said. “Go get it.”

Gold picked his cane up with a light toss and nodded at her a bit too smugly before disappearing behind the curtain. Emma stared after him, trying to hear every last movement. But nothing was reaching her ears; it was like Gold had faded out of existence altogether. With a sigh, Emma tore her gaze away and let her eyes roam the shop, and to her surprise, her stare tripped over not one but several items that caught her fancy -- the glass unicorn mobile in the window, the dreamcatcher hanging on the wall, and the soft-looking baby blanket that had clearly never been used, every single thread still white as snow. She’d thought, coming into the shop, that it was full of nothing but trash, but now she was starting to question.

She cast a glance over her shoulder to the back room, but Mr. Gold still wasn’t coming back, and she couldn’t hear a thing. For all she knew, he was sitting back there having a cup of tea.

And she wanted to touch that blanket.

It wasn’t locked up; it was draped over the back of a plush armchair, just asking for some kid to grab it and run -- not that any typical shoplifter would steal a baby blanket, Emma reminded herself. She inched forward, already flinching back, as if the blanket could rear up and bite her. When she put out her hand, it was the same shaking gesture one might use to approach a growling dog.

“You break it, you buy it,” said a voice behind her, and Emma whipped around to see Mr. Gold grinning at her. He stood with his hands planted on the counter, a nondescript cell phone lying just before them. Emma eyed it, inexplicably worried for a moment that she’d somehow broken their deal -- and that, somehow, Gold could keep the phone from her.

“Well,” said Gold, gesturing for her to come forward, “don’t you want to listen?”

Emma crossed the room, and in just a few seconds her usual confidence was back. She snatched the phone away, glaring at Gold in case he tried to stop her. Gold only smiled, and Emma turned her anger on the phone instead.

“What’s your passcode?” she asked as she pressed the Home button. It brought her to the start-up screen just as Gold said,

“I’m afraid I neglected to set one. I’m not what you would call a private man.”

Emma coughed out something similar to a laugh and flipped through the phone’s settings. For a moment, she was lost in the unfamiliar options.

“I record all my conversations,” Gold informed her.

“What?”

“Here.”  The phone transferred from her hands to his before Emma was aware of what was going on. Gold’s thumb swiped over the screen three times, and then he handed it back to her. There was an untitled audio file waiting there for her, dated for that day at 4:58 p.m. The file was thirty minutes long.

“Press play,” Gold invited her. Emma narrowed her eyes at him, but he wasn’t paying attention to her anymore; he’d taken a set of tin soldiers down from one of the shelves and procured a pallet and brush from somewhere else, and was busy touching up the shoddy paint job.

Emma pressed play.

A familiar voice filled the pawnshop.

“ _ Hello, is this Mr. Gold’s? _ ” said the staticky recording of Sheriff Graham Humbert. 

“ _ It is, indeed _ ,” Mr. Gold’s voice replied. The man himself glanced up, cat-like eyes trained on Emma, and then he returned with the smallest of smirks to his soldiers.

“ _ I need to get an anniversary present _ ,” said Graham. Emma’s brow furrowed; she and Graham had been dating for nearly two months now, and she wasn’t sure what he felt necessary to celebrate. “ _ I don’t really have time to come by right now, but -- I don’t know, I was hoping maybe you’d have something that’d just … come to mind _ .”

“ _ Well, that would depend entirely on this gift’s intended recipient. Why don’t you give me a brief description? _ ”

“ _ She’s classy _ ,” said Graham, no hesitation. “ _ She likes expensive things. I think she’d probably like something for her house. You know, decoration. _ ”

Emma didn’t need anyone to tell her that Graham wasn’t talking about her. Her eyes narrowed.

“ _ All right _ ,” said Mr. Gold. “ _ And what precisely is her decorating style? _ ”

“ _ Uh, black and white? She likes … I don’t know, a very stark color scheme, I guess. It’s very modern _ .”

“ _ Easy enough to conceptualise. I’ll see if I have anything in stock _ .”

“ _ Nothing tacky, please _ ,” said Graham. “ _ Regina hates tacky _ .”

“ _ Oh, it goes without saying _ .”

The conversation went on for twenty-eight more minutes, but Emma didn’t hear a word.

“Did you see anything you like?” Gold asked her when it was over and she had mutely handed him back the phone. Emma blinked furiously, trying to fight the tears in her eyes. They were mostly of anger, but she couldn’t deny an element of hurt. Two months. Only two months, and Graham was already cheating on her. And not just with anybody -- with Regina. With the woman who was keeping Emma away from her own son.

“Miss Swan?” said Mr. Gold, snapping his fingers under her nose. Emma jumped.

“What?”

“I asked if anything caught your fancy,” he said. When Emma gave him a blank look, he just added, “In the shop.”

“Oh.” She thought of the mobile, thought of the dreamcatcher, thought of the blanket. Thought of Graham and Regina fucking, with Henry in the house. “No,” she said, mouth dry, feeling sick. “I’ve got everything I need.”

Mr. Gold nodded once, carefully. “If you’re sure,” he said.

“I am.” She hesitated, hands on the counter and nearly touching his. She wanted to ask him questions, wanted to demand answers from him about Graham and Regina, the affair. But she swallowed the impulse, because there was no way Mr. Gold could even know what she was talking about. He’d barely been in town a week. “I’d better be going.”

He nodded again and Emma made her exit quick, worried she might break down in tears and that Mr. Gold would see. The cold night air hit her hard and gave her the extra boost she needed to tamp down and regain composure. So Graham was cheating on her. So what? She’d been hurt worse before.

She needed a drink.


End file.
